JOHNSTOWN — Residents in and around this Western Pennsylvania town commemorated the 30th anniversary of the 1977 flood that killed 85 people and affected thousands more.

The flood hit on July 19, 1977, when six dams surrounding Johnstown failed after more than 11 inches of rain fell in 10 hours. It marked the third time severe floods hit Johnstown.

"Officials said our river walls and other flood-prevention efforts undertaken after the 1936 Flood would protect us from the devastating waters that had battered and beaten us so badly in 1889 and again in 36," The Tribune-Democrat newspaper wrote in Friday's editions. "They were dead wrong."